Lake Wisconsin, Columbia County (all postings)

went out sunday and monday. started out yesterday trollin cranks. one kitty cat to show for it. rembered reading "BOOGS" posts.tried the marriage rig "slow death", ha ha. worked great. lots of fish of different species diferrent spots. worked even better today. biggest walter in a while 20 inches. still swimmin. lots of shorts, nice crappies and some whities, looks like some good stock for the coming years.

A Big Thank You to Joel Ballweg. We had a great time on Fathers Day morning. He kept us on fish all in various spots. He truly loves the sport of fishing and enjoys others catching the fish he knows are there. Looking forward to our next trip, AWESOME JOB!!!!

Ross

Sunday afternoon and I was back on the water with Matt Siuda & Dominic Seyfrit. They had fished Lake Wisconsin for crappies but never really specifically targeted walleyes & saugers. They hired me to take them out and show them the ropes so to speak.

We spent the entire afternoon trolling crank baits. The bite was never fast and furious but by moving around from spot to spot, we were able to keep catching fish on a regular basis.

The guys ended up with 34 walleyes & saugers, 10 legals & two slots. One slot fish was a 21" walleye and the other was a 22-1/4? sauger. The picture doesn't do this fish justice as it was a very broad fish.

Another one of those fish that I would love to pull over the side of the boat in late fall or early April. For guys who like to target sauger, a fish this size is a true trophy. We very lucky to have saugers this size and bigger in Lake Wisconsin.

It was a fun afternoon fishing with you two guys Matt & Dom!

Fished Sunday morning with a great group of local guys. Ross Mack, Jerry Niesen & Mike Ableidinger each have two daughters and they all three got the morning off to go fishing.

We spent most of the morning trolling cranks but also spent the last hour or so going over how to run Slow Death crawler rigs. Both techniques put fish in the boat for us. Trolling cranks caught more fish but to be fair, we also spent most of our time doing that.

We got off the water by 11:00am having landed 32 walleyes & saugers of which 11 were keepers.

All in all, it was a very enjoyable morning sharing a Fathers day morning with these three fathers.

Hope all the fathers out there had a great day!

In reference to Boog's post below - A big Thank You to Joel Ballweg for a great Saturday trip and for putting us on great numbers and a big fish. If anyone is looking for a great couple of hours of quality fishing, some new spots or techniques with a great teacher, and some good conversation with a guy who genuinely loves to fish and be on the water - give Joel a call- he's got a really nice thing going on Lake Wisconsin and I'll certainly be fishing with him again. Thanks Joel. Best of luck the rest of the season.

Spent Saturday afternoon fishing with Luke Johnson and his brother Matt. Luke and his dad spent a half day in my boat earlier this year under some horrible weather conditions which pretty much mirrored our fishing success. As much as I hate putting up poor results, it does happen from time to time. Because of our poor success on that particular day, Luke was given a half price trip and Saturday afternoon was when he elected to use it.

Trolling cranks was again our primary technique. We caught plenty of fish but did have some trouble catching legal size walleyes or saugers and even had a couple of better fish come unbuttoned just before reaching the net. For the half day trip, we ended up catching 38 walleyes & saugers of which 6 were legal and one heck of a nice slot fish.

The slot fish turned out to be a personal best walleye for Luke, measuring a hair over 27 inches. Long & skinny this fish was not. She had large head and exceptionally thick body for this time of the year and best of all, she put up a fantastic fight before we were finally able to slip a net under her, snap some pictures and release back into our favorite walleye lake.

Congrats on your new personal best walleye Luke! She was a real beauty!

On a side note, I happen to have Saturday available if anyone is interested in chasing some walleyes while the bite is hot.

Fished with Jack & Bill Danley this past Saturday morning. 2nd time I've had these guys in my boat. It was cold and rainy the first time and looked like we were going to be fishing in the rain again this time. Fortunately, we only had to deal with a few sprinkles in the early morning and that was about it.

Started out trolling cranks. Hit 3 different spots before finding some decent size fish.

Finished the morning with 29 walleyes & saugers. Ten legals & one slot fish that measured 21-1/2" long.

Had a great time fishing with you two again Jack & Bill!

Boog

Did get out last Friday (late report) chasing crappies in the AM... by mid afternoon I gave up. Never found them shallow, but out in 10-15' of water yet. Not many, but kept a half dozen good ones assuming they were post spawn... not so, they still were carrying eggs. Either they hadn't spawned yet, or are not going to and are absorbing the eggs?

Ended the day walleye fishing northern part of the lake... and after a bunch of sheephead, it was like the walleye moved in for a while and it was lights out quick. Drifting a jig and crawler down in current from 5-9' of water, and pulling a crank back up both worked. Short time pulled two slots, four keepers, a bunch of shorts and lost several other keepers at the net (crappie sized little net) with the current, and a casual effort in the first place.

Another fun day!

A real late report from last week very simple fantastic Bass fishing, got into some crappies early AM's and just killed the walleye before the storm hit. Total for Tue through Fri was 9 slot fish 21 to 27, 22 legals and a boat load of shorts. all trolling in the shallows and casting shallows to 8-10 drop offs. The Bass turned on when the dam was open with a lot of large fish hitting but short on crank baits and Thur. AM I could not buy a decent Bass. Also picked up 2 22 and 26 in Northern's and some large White Bass as well. Looking forward to next week.

Chipr26

Cycle guy this week made a couple of drifts with split shot rigs and night crawlers in one of the bays for the crappies and got a few as shallow as 7 feet on a small hump in the bay. Good Luck.

From Jeff Bennett

out for a great morning of fishing,slow death rigs and trolling got us a mixed bag of keepers along with 2 slot walleye 22" & 24".. thanks Darren

thank you.....

Cycleguy -I have been picking up 3-5 big crappies every trip while trolling for walleyes in 8'-17' depths. I think some are shallow yet but most have moved back out.

Anyone know if the crappie bite is going or if they have moved back out to the deep? Hate asking, but the almost two hour ride is killer now days. Love fishing up here, but would end up at a closer lake if my timing is way off.

PM works perfectly.... thanks

Thank you Joel Esoxluv